Valentino Garavani

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Valentino Clemente Ludovico Garavani (born May 11, 1932 in Voghera ) - internationally known as Valentino - is an Italian fashion designer and founder of the fashion company Valentino SpA .

Valentino became known from the mid-1960s with elegant haute couture evening gowns , which attracted prominent buyers, and with a bright red , the so-called Valentino red , which is often used in his collections . After being taken over by a holding company , Valentino left his company, which still exists under different management, in 2008.

Career

Valentino with Liz Hurley in Cannes (2007)

Valentino graduated from high school and after graduating from high school, he became involved in fashion by taking fashion drawing courses in Milan . In 1949, at the age of seventeen, he won a scholarship from the Paris Haute Couture Union and in 1950 trained as a fashion designer . He then worked for five years in the studio of fashion designer Jean Dessès . After a while he moved to Guy Laroche's studio for two years , after which he returned to his Italian homeland. He finally founded his own fashion house in Rome in 1959 - one of his first customers was Elizabeth Taylor , who was in the city for filming. In Giancarlo Giammetti , Valentino not only found the right manager for his company, but also his partner. Garavani himself worked as a creative fashion designer in his company. His fashion creations quickly became known worldwide and won many prizes. Garavani soon called himself Valentino in the fashion world, and it was under this name that his fashion became a worldwide term.

During his long career as a fashion designer, Valentino dressed numerous stars, including Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis from 1964 , whom he also outfitted in 1968 for her wedding to the Greek billionaire Aristotle Onassis . In addition to his success in the fashion world, Valentino also developed into a respected businessman. The company soon supplied around 560 stores worldwide and operated around 60 selected boutiques . In 1991 a retrospective of his fashion work was held in the Capitol Museum in Rome. The book entitled Valentino was created in conjunction with this event . Thirty Years of Magic , which documents its design art in detail.

Valentino also designed women's perfumes and other accessories . In 1980 the Italian motor vehicle manufacturer Alfa Romeo named a bronze-colored special model of the Alfasud , the purchase price of which included a Valentino handbag and a document folder, Alfasud Valentino after him . In 1990 Valentino founded an association to fight the immune disease AIDS .

In 1998 Valentino sold his company to the Italian general goods group HdP ( Holding di Partecipazioni Industriali ), whose subsidiary GFT had been Valentino's license partner for years, for a sum of 270 million euros. Although the sale was completed on Valentino's initiative, he cried when the contract was signed. Valentino also signed a five-year contract as a consultant and thus remained the company's chief designer. In 2001, however, the Valentino fashion brand slipped into the red. In 2002 the Italian Marzotto Group took over Valentino from HdP for 240 million euros (of which 204 million were liabilities, the purchase price was only 36 million euros) and in 2005 founded the Valentino Fashion Group . Valentino's contract was extended for another five years. In 2006 Valentino was made a Knight of the French Legion of Honor . In October 2007 Valentino announced his retirement from the fashion world for January 2008 after the British private equity firm Permira acquired a majority in his company and his contract as a designer had not been renewed. Permira employed new designers and discontinued a few brands within the Valentino portfolio. Since then, Valentino and Giammetti have sometimes appeared as invited guests at the Valentino fashion shows .

Private life

Valentino Garavani made a cameo in the 2006 film The Devil Wears Prada opposite Meryl Streep and Anne Hathaway. The documentary Valentino: The Last Emperor premiered at the Venice Film Festival in 2008 . The film was made from 2005 to 2007 under the direction of vanity fair journalist Matt Tyrnauer and deals with Valentino's final years of work and his relationship with Giancarlo Giammetti.

Valentino amassed immense personal fortune over the years, including a substantial real estate holdings. His private residences include the Palazzo Gabrielli-Mignanelli in Rome (located next to Piazza di Spagna , formerly the headquarters of Valentino SpA), a villa on Via Appia Antica just outside the city, and a villa on Capri (sold in 2010 ), a town house in the Holland Park district of London , the Château de Widewille at the gates of Paris not far from Plaisir , the Chalet Gifferhorn in Gstaad and an apartment in Manhattan with a view of Central Park .

Valentino has been in a relationship with the American jewelry designer and ex- model Bruce Hoeksema since 1982 .

Creations

The creations of the Italian designer stood for the highest degree of elegance and extraordinary style . Valentino preferred a simple design, preferably in white, black or red. The most striking sign of his fashion was the decoration with pearl and sequin embroidery as well as with gold lace or silver. He drew inspiration for his fashionable style and design from works of the fine arts. In 1990 he founded the Accademia Valentino in Rome, which is dedicated to Italian art.

See also

Web links

Commons : Valentino Garavani  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Europe Online Magazine, Masters of Elegance , published and accessed May 5, 2012
  2. ^ The Guardian: Valentino and Mr. Giammetti: a touching love story behind the tears and tantrums (August 28, 2008). Retrieved January 2, 2009
  3. ↑ 45 years of Valentino - child of the gods of couture , sueddeutsche.de, July 22, 2007
  4. ↑ So very Valentino , vanityfair.com, August 2004
personal data
SURNAME Garavani, Valentino
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Valentino; Garavani, Valentino Clemente Ludovico (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian fashion designer
DATE OF BIRTH May 11, 1932
PLACE OF BIRTH Voghera , Italy